The process of optimizing a website – as well as all the content on that website – so it will appear in prominent positions in the organic results of search engines. SEO requires an understanding of how search engines work, what people search for, and why and how people search. Successful SEO makes a site appealing to users and search engines. It is a combination of technical and marketing.
Digital marketing is probably the fastest-changing marketing field out there: New tools are being built, more platforms emerge and more channels need to be included into your marketing plan. How not to get overwhelmed while staying on top of the latest marketing trends? Here are a few tools that help you scale and automate some parts of your marketing routine making you a more productive and empowered marketer: Tools to Semi-Automate Marketing Tasks 1.
Before Sharpe ever came into close proximity with the internet marketing field, he was a construction worker. Needing a way to make ends meet, like millions of other people around the world, he turned to a field that could hopefully pay the bills. But try as he might, he was never able to actually get ahead. Until one day, when Sharpe discovered the amount of money being made online by internet marketers, his entire mindset changed.

Pay Per Click Advertising (PPC) - While SEO is free, pay-per-click ads are just as they sound; ads you run on a search engine that you pay for each time someone clicks on it. In PPC advertising, you bid the amount you are willing to pay per click. In general, the more you bid, the higher your ad will llikely appear in the search engine results. Google AdWords ​has implemented an additional factor in which your ads are ranked based on the relevancy or importance that Google places on your site, which is very difficult to manipulate. You can also use pay per click advertising to your advantage on your own site. For example, you can make money with Google AdSense and other similar programs.

However, while bidding $1,000 on every keyword and ranking #1 for every relevant search sounds nice in theory, most businesses have to play a balancing game between ranking higher and paying too much for clicks. After all, if it costs $17.56 to rank in position #1, but you can only afford to pay $5.00 per click, bidding $1,000 on a keyword to guarantee yourself the #1 position would be a great way to bid yourself out of business.
From this portal, you’ll find all sorts of viewer insights. Discover what types of video content your audience likes and how they watch their videos. Then, channel those insights directly into your marketing automation software or CRM. For example, if that prospect you’ve been monitoring views your latest case study video, you’ll be notified straightaway.
As mentioned earlier, technology and the internet allows for 24 hours a day, 7 days a week service for customers as well as enabling them to shop online at any hour of that day or night, not just when the shops are over and across the whole world. This is a huge advantage for retailers to use it and direct customers from the store to its online store. It has also opened up an opportunity for companies to only be online based rather than having an outlet or store due to the popularity and capabilities of digital marketing.
The inbound methodology is the marketing and sales approach focused on attracting customers through content and interactions that are relevant and helpful. Each video you create should acknowledge your audience’s challenges and provide a solution. Looking at the big picture, this content guides consumers through the journey of becoming aware of, evaluating, and purchasing your product or service.
After your site has been built out, creating a social media presence is the best second step for most businesses. All businesses should have a Facebook Page that’s fully fleshed out with plenty of information about your business. Depending on your audience, you can also start a Twitter, Instagram, and/or Pinterest account. Social media is a long-term commitment that requires frequently updating and monitoring, but it’s one of the best ways to build an online community around your business.
There’s no avoiding it: internet marketing is critical for the success of your business in 2018. But with all the gimmicks and tricks, it can be difficult to distinguish short-term wins from effective long-term strategies, which is why we’ve created an ultimate guide. Here, we’ll cover everything from marketing strategies to real-world examples, to ensure your business reaches the right people out of that four billion.
Pay a SEO consultant to do a regular evaluation of your website. SEO is a continuously progressing science. Every time a search engine changes its algorithm, a SEO professional changes their SEO advice. There are hundreds of things you can do to help SEO ranking. What is practical for your business depends upon the website, the products and the keywords you use.

In some contexts, the term SEM is used exclusively to mean pay per click advertising,[2] particularly in the commercial advertising and marketing communities which have a vested interest in this narrow definition. Such usage excludes the wider search marketing community that is engaged in other forms of SEM such as search engine optimization and search retargeting.
Test and Listen. Think you can record the perfect voice over in just one take? Think again! Invest in a good pair of headphones and keep an eye on your audio quality throughout the recording process. It’s easier to get a new take of audio than trying to fix it during the editing process. We recommend running through your script a few times, especially the first few paragraphs, to ensure that your voice is fully warmed up. If you hear popping or hissing sounds, try standing further away from the mic or invest in a pop filter.
Soda companies have been known for their memorable marketing campaigns -- both Coca-Cola and Pepsi are in the first commercial break of the Super Bowl every year with an intense new spot. In the video above, Coca-Cola treated the Philippines market to a Christmas campaign that gave more than 15,000 people a surprise gift for the holidays. And it only starts with a Coke.
Billions of people search the web every day. Search engine marketing (SEM for short) is how you can get your ads in front of these future customers where it counts: in premium spots on the first page of search results. You set your own budget and are charged only when your ad is clicked. This makes SEM an affordable way to reach more customers for businesses of all sizes — including yours.
However, while bidding $1,000 on every keyword and ranking #1 for every relevant search sounds nice in theory, most businesses have to play a balancing game between ranking higher and paying too much for clicks. After all, if it costs $17.56 to rank in position #1, but you can only afford to pay $5.00 per click, bidding $1,000 on a keyword to guarantee yourself the #1 position would be a great way to bid yourself out of business.
In 2013, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals held in Lens.com, Inc. v. 1-800 Contacts, Inc. that online contact lens seller Lens.com did not commit trademark infringement when it purchased search advertisements using competitor 1-800 Contacts' federally registered 1800 CONTACTS trademark as a keyword. In August 2016, the Federal Trade Commission filed an administrative complaint against 1-800 Contacts alleging, among other things, that its trademark enforcement practices in the search engine marketing space have unreasonably restrained competition in violation of the FTC Act. 1-800 Contacts has denied all wrongdoing and is scheduled to appear before an FTC administrative law judge in April 2017.[29]
Search Engine Optimization (SEO): Maximizes search result exposure by targeting and driving Web traffic and ultimately delivering increased sales. The majority of search engine page results come from unpaid or organic search. SEO optimizes websites to ensure top search engine placement, such as Google, as only 15 percent of searchers continue beyond page one.

All sites have a home or "root" page, which is usually the most frequented page on the site and the starting place of navigation for many visitors. Unless your site has only a handful of pages, you should think about how visitors will go from a general page (your root page) to a page containing more specific content. Do you have enough pages around a specific topic area that it would make sense to create a page describing these related pages (for example, root page -> related topic listing -> specific topic)? Do you have hundreds of different products that need to be classified under multiple category and subcategory pages?

Website ranking doesn't just come from what's on your website. Google, the number one search engine used today, uses a variety of other factors to rank websites. Things like your social media activity, appearances on other sites through interviews or guest blogging, and being listed as a resource on another site all increase your standing in Google's eyes.
Search Engine Marketing or SEM encompasses the steps taken to increase relevant traffic to your website, through higher rankings on search engines. Traditional SEM is made up of two processes: “organic” search engine optimization (SEO) and pay-per-click advertising (PPC) (or cost-per-click (CPC)). However, the field of SEM is a changing and expanding field thanks to constant new developments, such as:
There’s a lot leading up to this day, but what a day! Production dayExtended Article7 Must-Know Tips for Production Day FilmingIt’s production day! All your planning and creative brainstorming have led to this. Whether you’re handling production yourself or have hired a team to… Read More can be crazy and hectic, or totally cool and organized. It’s when you finally see your video come to life for the first time — there’s a definite feeling of accomplishment. Exciting as it may be, there’s still a lot to do to ensure your video is the best it can be.

Most people need to take a step back and understand where money is even coming from on the web. Sharpe says that, when asked, most individuals don't actually even know how money is being made on a high level. How does Facebook generate its revenues? How about Google? How do high-trafficked blogs become so popular and how do they generate money from all of that traffic? Is there one way or many?

The fact is, YouTube is the second biggest search engine, next to Google. Yet in a recent study, 87% of marketers said they planned on placing video ads on Facebook, compared with 81.5% on YouTube. Don’t make the mistake of valuing one over the other, even with fancy numbers like Facebook’s 4 billion video views: after all, Facebook videos autoplay, so any view that lasts at least 3 seconds is counted as a full view. 4 billion is an impressive number no matter how you look at it, but keep the whole story in mind.
One video is great, but the more often you post engaging video, the better. It may not be realistic to post videos every single day or for every single initiative, but if you’ve got a major campaign you’re working on or an initiative that would really benefit from video, dedicate some resources to video creation. Even overlaying text on a piece of stock footage can be highly engaging on your website and bring more visitors from organic search.
This isn't about off-the-shelf solutions. You need to really convey something illustrious and beautiful, then fill it with incredible MVP content. Over time, this will become a thriving hotbed of activity for you, where people will come by and check-in repeatedly to see what you're talking about and what value you're delivering. Keep in mind that this won't happen quickly. It will take years. Yes, I said years.
Organic search (SEO): When you enter a keyword or phrase into a search engine like Google or Yahoo!, the organic results are displayed in the main body of the page.When your prospects search for information about your products and services, you want to rank highly in search engine results. By “optimizing” your site, you can improve your ranking for important search terms and phrases (“keywords”). You can also improve your rank by getting other important sites to link to yours.
There are things like solo ads that you can buy or join up with JV partners to help sell whatever it is that you're peddling. But at the outset, you're going to find it difficult to succeed in the internet marketing field. Ensure that you learn the right skills along the way so that you can become an effective online marketer. It doesn't matter how slow you go, as long as you don't stop, you'll reach your goals.
Make it as easy as possible for users to go from general content to the more specific content they want on your site. Add navigation pages when it makes sense and effectively work these into your internal link structure. Make sure all of the pages on your site are reachable through links, and that they don't require an internal "search" functionality to be found. Link to related pages, where appropriate, to allow users to discover similar content.
You may not want certain pages of your site crawled because they might not be useful to users if found in a search engine's search results. If you do want to prevent search engines from crawling your pages, Google Search Console has a friendly robots.txt generator to help you create this file. Note that if your site uses subdomains and you wish to have certain pages not crawled on a particular subdomain, you'll have to create a separate robots.txt file for that subdomain. For more information on robots.txt, we suggest this Webmaster Help Center guide on using robots.txt files13.

Need some help with your search engine optimization? Need an SEO plugin that helps you reach for the stars? Yoast SEO is the original WordPress SEO plugin since 2008. It is the favorite tool of millions of users, ranging from the bakery around the corner to some of the most popular sites on the planet. With Yoast SEO, you get a solid toolset that helps you aim for that number one spot in the search results. Yoast: SEO for everyone.

This is any form of content which was paid for, usually by a company promoting another company or brand. It is written in the style of the site publishing it, much like native advertising, but isn’t actually an ad — it’s a valuable piece of written or visual content meant to inform the viewer. Usually, sponsored posts get organically shared via social networks, too, so they get an extra push when it comes to distribution.
There are many websites that offer advice, case studies, and best practices for marketing campaigns. But the only true way to test what works with a target audience is to test different options live and see what happens. This is the data-driven approach to marketing touted by many marketing specialists and often implemented by high-growth companies to rapidly test simultaneous ideas.

In this new world of digital transparency brands have to be very thoughtful in how they engage with current and potential customers. Consumers have an endless amount of data at their fingertips especially through social media channels, rating and review sites, blogs, and more. Unless brands actively engage in these conversations they lose the opportunity for helping guide their brand message and addressing customer concerns.

Another one of the benefits of SEM is that people who see your PPC ads are those most likely to want to buy your product or service. PPC ads require you to choose a geographic location and specific search queries to target. As a result, you can be sure that anyone who clicks on your ad is not arbitrarily surfing the web, but rather, is looking for your product or service and in a position to do so.
For instance, you might use Facebook’s Lookalike Audiences to get your message in front of an audience similar to your core demographic. Or, you could pay a social media influencer to share images of your products to her already well-established community. Paid social media can attract new customers to your brand or product, but you’ll want to conduct market research and A/B testing before investing too much in one social media channel.

In 2013, the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals held in Lens.com, Inc. v. 1-800 Contacts, Inc. that online contact lens seller Lens.com did not commit trademark infringement when it purchased search advertisements using competitor 1-800 Contacts' federally registered 1800 CONTACTS trademark as a keyword. In August 2016, the Federal Trade Commission filed an administrative complaint against 1-800 Contacts alleging, among other things, that its trademark enforcement practices in the search engine marketing space have unreasonably restrained competition in violation of the FTC Act. 1-800 Contacts has denied all wrongdoing and is scheduled to appear before an FTC administrative law judge in April 2017.[29]

Watch time and view-through rate are two of the most important metrics to measure engagement. These are the most absolute numbers that’ll give you an idea of how engaging your content is. Less absolute numbers include lifts in favorability and brand interest. You can also use things like comments and shares to measure engagement when you post your video on social media.
Basically Google uses a complex mathematical formula called an algorithm to give a score to every website and every search people to do in Google to figure out which website should rank best for what people are looking for. Think of the algorithm like a collection of empty buckets. One bucket gives you a score for the quality of your site, one bucket gives you a score for how many sites link to you, one bucket gives you a score for how people trust you. Your job is to fill up more buckets in the algorithm than any other website. You can affect your search engine ranking by having the highest score in terms of quality of your site, of having the highest score in terms of authority of your website, of having the highest score in terms of the most trusted store for that search that people are looking for. The good thing is that there are hundreds of buckets, and for every single one of these buckets these scores put together in the algorithm to figure out where you rank is an opportunity for you to fill it up and rank better. So optimizing your site for search results really means getting the highest score in as many of these points as you can.

SEO is an effective tool for improving the volume and quality of traffic to your website. Visitors are more likely to click on free organic listings than on paid listings. Our SEO strategies apply only the best and most current practices that focus on the use of great content development, content marketing, social media. All of these strategies combined result in the most effective use of best practices that drive long term ROI.

Baseline ranking assessment. You need to understand where you are now in order to accurately assess your future rankings. Keep a simple Excel sheet to start the process. Check weekly to begin. As you get more comfortable, check every 30 to 45 days. You should see improvements in website traffic, a key indicator of progress for your keywords. Some optimizers will say that rankings are dead. Yes, traffic and conversions are more important, but we use rankings as an indicator.